


as ordinary things often do

by zealotarchaeologist



Category: Control (Video Game)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/F, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, breakfast food!, choose your flavor: depressing or sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-20
Updated: 2019-10-20
Packaged: 2020-12-24 14:43:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21101183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zealotarchaeologist/pseuds/zealotarchaeologist
Summary: Several months before/after the Hiss attack on the FBC, the Director and Head of Research perform a ritual/engage in courtship/eat breakfast.





	as ordinary things often do

**Author's Note:**

> i remain seriously enamored by the way the game sets these two relationships up in contrast. not even in a romantic way necessarily, though of course that's the angle i'm taking here.

Betrayal comes from all sides. He knows this better than anyone. At 6 am, under the grating fluorescent lights of his apartment kitchen, Zachariah Trench is having a crisis. And his coffeemaker doesn’t have the decency to work.

“Fuck you,” he snaps, and pulls the plug out of the wall. Shoves it back in. Still nothing. Damn thing doesn’t even make a noise.

He knows, of course, this isn’t the thing he’s mad about. He’s mad at his own weakness. Mad at himself for waking up after barely 4 hours of sleep with his face pressed into Darling’s back in an undignified way.

He’s never brought anyone here before. Wouldn’t want to. Didn’t have the time. His place is a cage for sleeping in, nothing more. But Darling isn’t just anyone, and last night it had seemed like the only logical way to convince them both away from work for a while. Now he’s wondering why he left, with so much still left to do. He should be trying to fix everything, not letting someone untrustworthy near him when he’s asleep and vulnerable.

The Director does not panic. So he does the only thing he can. Stand up. Get dressed. Stay in control. Make coffee. Put stale bread in the ancient toaster.

He smacks the coffee machine with the heel of his palm and it finally, blessedly rumbles to life. The toaster dings, pops out something not-too-burnt that he can throw on a plate. Why is he doing this? He hasn’t prepared his own food in ages. And Darling isn’t some date he needs to impress.

“Oh!” Speak of the devil. Caspar Darling stumbles into the kitchen in boxers and undershirt, blinking without his glasses. “You made coffee.”

“Help yourself.” Trench says, as if it doesn’t really matter to him one way or the other, focuses on finding a clean pan. He doesn’t want to look at him, doesn’t want to be overtaken by whatever foolish impulse made him take Darling home last night instead of just fucking it out of their system at work like usual. The fact that he can think of that as _usual_ is a bad sign, a very bad sign.

The range stutters and clicks on, coil slowly turning red. Darling brushes up behind him on the way to the coffee pot and he tenses up, feels his shoulders raise like an animal. Last night he had felt…not safe, never safe, but at least in control. And held, for a moment, understood. Now he feels like a tired, middle-aged man still trying and failing to smother his feelings.

Careful. Methodical. He is in his space. These are simple steps, a routine he knows. What he used to do while the wife slept in. Went over with his mother a million times as a kid—you have to learn to take care of yourself. Wait for the oil to get hot enough. Crack the eggs cleanly. Don’t let the yolk break.

“Didn’t know you cooked.”

If you call this cooking. Burnt toast and fried eggs. “Don’t usually have a reason to.” It’s been a long time since he has, and even then he was only passable at it.

Darling lets it drop, thankfully. They’ve worked together long enough—been close long enough, really—that he knows when to keep his mouth shut. Even though that usually doesn’t stop him.

Today he shuts up and drinks his coffee, sighs in mundane pleasure. The noise distracts Trench for just a second, just long enough to make him look up from his task.

Darling is making himself audaciously at home in his kitchen, pulls up a chair with his second cup of coffee. It creaks horribly. Trench never sits down when he eats. If he eats.

It’s been a while since they last slept together. It’s been even longer since he’s seen Darling in the light, out of his lab coat and sweater. He understands better than many the careful choice of costume. Makes him look soft and nonthreatening, hides all that muscle. Maybe Darling even thinks of himself that way, just your friendly local scientist, just your fun boss.

Trench knows better. Knows how razor sharp and often unpleasant the guy can be. For someone who tries very hard to come off as friendly he does an excellent job of alienating others. Frankly, it’s something that he used to like about Darling. It’s no use for the Director to have a chorus of yes-men, he needs what Darling provides. Someone to challenge him, someone to strike out when Trench wants to be conservative, someone to brace against. Someone he can trust.

“Cas—” He starts to say, realizes he doesn’t know what he’s thinking. _Caspar, I think I’m losing my shit? I think something bad is coming? I can’t carry it all anymore, I’m just one man?_ “—never mind.” He turns back to the pan.

His silence hangs tensely between them, broken only by the sizzling eggs. Focus, he needs to focus, needs to do this right. He doesn’t turn around, already knows what he’ll see: Darling’s face knit up more in curiosity than concern, looking at him like a puzzle to be solved.

“How’s your head been?” Darling asks, an olive branch that Trench wants to smack away. He was the one who insisted nothing was wrong, that all the tests were normal, even though Trench _knows_ what he felt.

“It’s fine.” He huffs back, and is glad it comes out more tired than angry. “I’m fine.”

Stupid of him, to bring the enemy into his home. Darling’s not his confidant—whatever he might want him to be, Darling is not.

_But it was nice, wasn’t it?_ Thinks a small part of him, the part that’s been more and more quiet these days. Nice to be in a bed with another human being again. Nice to have something that isn’t a hurried touch in a desperate situation.

Darling seems oblivious to his inner turmoil. He hums to himself as he drinks his second cup of coffee. Some poppy song, one he’s heard Darling half-sing a thousand times before but suddenly can’t remember the name of. His memory’s been a little off, lately.

He stops, notices Trench staring. Smiles, in that earnest and infuriating way. “It’s nice seeing you like this. Different.”

Different. Sure.

In the pan, the yolk splits and oozes.

For the first time in a very, very long while, Jesse Faden wakes up at a normal time.

She had been ready to leave at some horrible hour of the morning, was going to slip her shoes on and head back to work before Emily mumbled something to the effect of “I know your schedule better than you do, you’re fine,” and dragged her back into bed.

And now, well, she doesn’t regret it at all. The bed is a pull-out that folds into a couch but it’s still a real bed and not a sofa in her office. Light filters in from the single window, blinds half down, and shimmers into a blue fractal over her body. _Good morning._ Jesse stretches once, twice, enjoying the slight ache of previous exertions, and starts to sit up.

Emily is still dead asleep, snoring faintly. On the rare occasions Jesse can convince her to stop working and sleep like a normal person for once, she becomes totally immovable. The back of her hair is sticking up against the pillow. Carefully, Jesse smooths it back down.

Jesse can’t sit still, has never been very good at staying in bed regardless of the circumstances. So she goes digging through the one small dresser and ends up with a tank top and shorts that fit her well enough. At least well enough for her not to feel exposed as she moves around the apartment hunting for some cereal or something.

The kitchen (like the rest of Emily’s apartment) is sparse. There’s a coffee machine that has seen recent use, but everything else looks like it hasn’t been touched in months. Which, by what she knows of Emily’s schedule, it probably hasn’t.

She opens drawers, cupboards, looks through the small fridge. She’s not being nosy, exactly, just curious, and curiosity is always encouraged in the Research division. There’s milk and sugar at least, for coffee. The end of a bag of flour, an untouched box of baking powder. No eggs in the fridge, but she can work with that. Half a chocolate bar, she can chop that up and--

Jesse stops moving on autopilot, suddenly aware of what she’s doing. Sure, she’s hungry, but she could order something. Could go out and get donuts for the two of them. Instead she’s cooking.

It’s been a long time since she has, at least since a couple months before everything went down. She cooked for herself when she could, those long horrible 17 years, but when she could was rarely. And before that, she tries not to think about before that.

_Fuck it,_ she thinks, making plenty of noise as she rummages around for a suitable pan. _I’m cooking. Pancakes now, introspection later._

Polaris flickers over her vision, helps her find her way around the kitchen. She settles for an oversized novelty mug as a mixing bowl, and stirs with her mind while her hands focus on crumbling chocolate. Lately she’s been practicing the small, trying to learn some finesse. She’ll always prefer a big explosion, but this has its uses.

She’s just started the first batch sizzling pleasantly when Emily shuffles in, yawning. “Jesse? What smells like chocolate—” She’s wearing one of Jesse’s shirts, some old oversized band t-shirt that hangs down to her thighs. _I was wondering where that went. _When she sees Jesse she blinks, fully taken off guard. Shakes her head and laughs, like she did when they first met, amazed. “Oh my god. Of course you can cook. You’re a delightful anomaly, have I told you that lately?”

“I don’t know if I’d say I can cook.” She shrugs, and very casually flips a pancake with her mind.

Emily sidles up behind her, slips her hands around Jesse’s waist. Their bare legs press together. “Better than me. I’m a cup noodle kind of girl since college.” She tucks her head against Jesse’s shoulder, kisses the side of her neck. It makes her shiver, makes heat curl at her fingers. But it’s pleasant, not urgent, knowing that they have all the time in the world. It can wait until after breakfast. One more kiss and Emily detaches, starts making coffee in a practiced routine.

“They might not turn out great. It’s been a while since I tried.” The words catch a little in her throat as she’s saying them, before she even realizes the gravity of it. “I used to make them a lot with. My brother.”

Emily doesn’t miss a beat. “Good thing you’re practicing, then. I bet he’ll want to eat something that didn’t come from the cafeteria.”

“Yeah.” It helps a little, how Emily pragmatically takes these things in stride. If she didn’t think it was going to be okay, she wouldn’t lie. “Thanks. Here—" Jesse clicks the burner off, goes to grab for a plate and finds she has to really search for it. There’s exactly one, up on a higher cabinet and she pulls it down, focuses on stacking the pancakes neatly.

Probably not her finest work; they’re all slightly burnt on one side and a little too pale on the other. She’s not quitting her job to become a chef anytime soon. But chocolate chip pancakes are chocolate chip pancakes, and she floats the plate down right in the center of the tiny kitchen table.

“Fuck, sorry.” Emily sighs when she notices the single plate. Still, she doesn’t make any move to change it, just sets a cup of coffee and a fork on each side and sits. She leans on her hands, waiting for Jesse to join her. “I don’t really spend a lot of time here. Uh, as you know.”

“You take after Darling a little, huh?” It’s a more loaded thing to say than she means.

Emily makes her thinking face, clearly taking mental notes but not offense. “Do I?”

Jesse takes the chair next to her, shoulder to shoulder in the small space. “You do practically sleep under your desk.”

“No, I sleep under yours.” Under the table, she nudges her foot against Jesse’s. “And you’re just as bad!”

“Hey,_ I_ don’t have an apartment to go back to.” And then she can’t wait any longer, and eats.

It’s good. Not the uncomplicated kind of childhood-good but good in the way everything in her new life is, even with the burnt parts bitter and the chocolate chunks too big. It’s still something she made for them with her own hands.

Emily’s eyes light up when she takes a bite. And it’s not that big of a deal, really, they’re just some shitty pancakes, but it makes her feel warm. “All this without even real dishes. Your powers seriously have no limit.” Jesse tries, really tries to focus on her own food and not stare. She can’t articulate why it feels so important. This, somehow, is more novel to her than all the weird shit at the Bureau. She’s been dealing with weird shit all her life, but she’s never stuck around someone long enough to have breakfast together the morning after.

“I could buy you plates.” Comes out of her mouth, even though it’s nothing close to what she meant to say. “Or, I mean, we could get some. Together.”

Emily stares at her for a moment. Then her mouth turns up, her eyes shine like when she’s on the scent of a new theory. “Director Faden,” she says, teasing clear in her voice, “Are you trying to move in with me?”

It’s not exactly what Jesse meant. And yet. “Pretty sure we technically live together already.” She’s thankful that she has to pause to swallow another mouthful. It sort of diffuses the vulnerable place she’s putting herself in, here. “But it might be nice to have privacy sometimes. You know, if you’re worried about me not having a place to sleep.”

“It really would.” She sounds almost wistful, like neither of them can quite believe the idea. But Emily’s smile is growing, which generally means she’s perfecting a plan in her head. “We could even have dinner sometime. If only I had plates.”

“I won’t even take it out of your paycheck.”

“Wow, you’re so sweet.”

They split the last pancake down the middle. Turns out, that one came out perfectly.


End file.
